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Colorado State Rep. Joe Salazar sorry for rape comment

A Colorado Democratic state lawmaker is apologizing for a comment he made about rape after conservatives lambasted him for the remark, saying in a statement that he is “deeply sorry.”

State Rep. Joe Salazar argued last week, during a Colorado House debate concerning concealed-carry permits on college campuses, that guns bring with them the possibility of shooting the wrong person “if you feel like you’re gonna be raped, or if you feel like someone’s been following you around or if you feel like you’re in trouble when you may actually not be.”

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He apologized with multiple uses of the word “sorry” on Tuesday, a day after saying he was “deeply sorry if I offended anyone.”

“I want to reiterate my point from yesterday; I am deeply sorry,” Salazar said in a statement sent to POLITICO. “The words I said near the end of a 12-hour debate are not reflective of the point I was trying to make. I am a husband and father of two girls. I care deeply about their safety, and I would never question a woman’s ability to discern a threat. My larger point was about how more guns on campus don’t mean you’re more safe. I used a bad example. Again, I’m sorry.”

In an earlier apology, he sought to clarify his debate comments, according to a Monday statement posted by FOX31 Denver, the Fox affiliate.

“We were having a public policy debate on whether or not guns makes people safer on campus,” he said in part on Monday. I don’t believe they do. That was the point I was trying to make. If anyone thinks I’m not sensitive to the dangers women face, they’re wrong...Again, I’m deeply sorry if I offended anyone with my comments.”

Last Friday, Salazar said during the debate that women have a number of options if they feel threatened.

“It’s why we have call boxes, it’s why we have safe zones, it’s why we have the whistles. Because you just don’t know who you’re gonna be shooting at,” Salazar said during the debate. “And you don’t know if you feel like you’re gonna be raped, or if you feel like someone’s been following you around or if you feel like you’re in trouble when you may actually not be, that you pop out that gun and you pop … pop a round at somebody.”

That statement sparked outrage in the conservative blogosphere and on Twitter, as some likened Salazar to onetime Senate hopeful Todd Akin, a Republican whose own comments about rape sank his campaign in Missouri last summer.

“This “feel like you’re going to be raped” nonsense is as poorly-worded as the “shut that whole thing down” drama from last fall,” charged conservative commentator Dana Loesch in a post at RedState.com, referencing Akin’s comments. “If Democrats don’t swiftly condemn this, I see this used as a tactic to showcase the vast lack of respect Democrats have for a woman’s right to self defense.”